Pay Attention to the Man Behind WZRD – Kid Cudi Branches Out

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Kid Cudi is heading into yet another direction and we’re just all along for the ride. Kid Cudi revealed on Twitter (now @wizardcud) back in January of his rock inspired album with help from Dot Da Genius. WZRD (not “wizard” but W-Z-R-D) is a departure from his rap cred, but a departure that has been in the making for some time. On Kid Cudi’s sophomore album Man on the Moon II: The Legend of Mr. Rager, Kid Cudi introduced less studio production beats and more instrument heavy tracks. WZRD is very much in that same vein, as Cudi pushes into the rock realm, much like Kanye West pushed into auto-tuned singing on 808 & Heartbreaks. Another similarity between the two albums are the mixed reviews from critics.

Review of WZRD

Kid Cudi is pushing beyond his element – learning guitar, writing music sober for the first time (which induced a five-month long writer’s block), and branching out to a lot of different musical influence. For instance, on WZRD‘s Teleport 2 Me, Jamie, Dot Da Genius samples “Under Your Spell” by Desire, which was featured heavily in the movie Drive, starring Ryan Gosling. Aside from that one exception, Kid Cudi and Dot Da Genius have put together a well-produced but somewhat uninspired album in this rock collaboration. We’re left with similar thumping tracks on WZRD like “Erase Me,” but without the lyrical brilliance that we’ve come to expect from Kid Cudi.

Teleport 2 Me, Jamie

March 7th 2012 – Performing on Conan

Kid Cudi News

Among his various upcoming performances, Kid Cudi was also announced as a performing at the upcoming Rock the Bells hip-hop music festival taking place over three weekends in late August and September.